This is rapidly becoming the “Year of the Concert” for me.  On kind of a spur of the moment, I caught a live show of Joan Jett and the Blackhearts tonight. Fantastic concert! They played all of their old classics and new material off their recent “Sinner” album. All of it was wonderful. Joan Jett has a great stage presence and comes across as very humble and down-to-earth. I’m very happy I decided to go!

I’m even happier that the pre-show announcer mentioned that Cheap Trick is coming to the same venue in November. I’ll will absolutely be in the audience!

One advantage to living near the airport… when I notice it has stopped raining and it’s shaping up to be a beautiful evening, I can hop in the car and go snap a few photos!

A few more shots in the usual spot!

Added more photos to the set from this past weekend!

Yeah, this mini-vacation was definitely too short! Made it home safe and sound though. Lindsey and I both enjoyed the trip.  Saturday we drove out to Westport, WA as planned and goofed around a while.  Couldn’t figure out exactly where the kite event was so we punted on that. Spent the night in a hotel in Aberdeen, WA right on the river. Enjoyed spending time in their indoor pool!

Sunday morning dawned cold, gray and rainy. We decided not to head back to Westport and instead headed north along the coast to do the loop around the Olympic National Park. The weather on the coast eventually cleared up and it became a beautiful day. We jagged back and forth between the coastline and the interior as we followed Hwy 101 north.

Lindsey’s goal for the day was to walk on the beach and look for rocks and seashells. After stopping at Lake Quinault for a snack, we chatted with the clerk and he recommended we visit Ruby Beach. Boy was he right, it was beautiful and exactly what we were looking for! Definitely the highlight of our trip!

As usual, more photos at Flickr!

My daughter Lindsey and I are off on a two-day photo safari to the Washington coast. The general plan is to head out towards Westport, but who knows where we’ll actually wind up.  I’ve got a motel reservation out in that general area for Saturday night at least.

I know that there’s a kite flying event nearby and a maritime museum with a lighthouse that sounds interesting. Aside from that we’re going to follow our instincts and see where they take us. I suspect a fantastic seafood dinner should be included at some point. I know the motel has an indoor, heated pool and Lindsey is looking forward to that also!

Hope you have a great weekend too!

Lindsey and I went to see Walking With Dinosaurs at the Tacoma Dome today. This was the opening venue for this Australian show on its North American tour. If you or your kids like dinosaurs, I highly recommend you see it visits a city near you! It’s an entertaining and dramatic history lesson featuring life-sized dinosaurs operated via animatronics and puppetry. Hosted by a live actor in the role of a paleontologist, it is surprisingly humorous and touching at times. We both had a blast!

A few more photos at Flickr.

I was in Best Buy yesterday looking for a DVD.  They didn’t have what I wanted but I did find (and buy) the 25th Anniversary Edition of the movie Taps.

Talk about a blast from the past! This movie came out in 1981, while I was in high school.  I was a gung ho young Army ROTC cadet in those days and along with many of my friends, saw this movie several times when it came out. It actually led to discipline problems at school when many of us were inspired by the movie to wear red berets. The administration finally cracked down on the practice and banned us from wearing them. I honestly don’t remember what kind of trouble we caused but it must have been noteworthy!

The photo above is from my senior year. On the left is Cadet Carl Cummings, a school chum from the period and one year behind me I think. As I recall, he was a cadet captain at this time. I’m on the right, a cadet colonel and the overall cadet commander of the two school ROTC unit we belonged to. I can only tell you that I’m a senior based on the medals and ribbons I’m wearing, I don’t remember the occasion of this photo!

Hard to believe all of this happened so long ago… apparently, I’m getting old…

Technically it’s not the fourth any longer, but I hope you had a great day anyway! I waffled all day long about whether I was going to a fireworks display or not. I finally headed over to Alki across the bay from Seattle at the last minute. Apparently several thousand other people had the same idea. I wound up skipping Alki proper and heading up Admiralty Way to the viewpoint there. I was hoping to see both of the big fireworks displays but alas, I could only see the Space Needle fireworks from where I set up. Still, not a bad view eh?

A few more photos from tonight at Flickr!

Today was warm and sunny, the nicest day we’re forecast to have for a while. It trends cooler with a chance of rain for the next week or so.

I took advantage of the beautiful day to go recce the neighborhoods off the north end of Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. I wanted to find a spot where I could get good aviation photos. After trying a couple of other spots I stumbled over a perfect location.

Traffic was departing to the north today, so they were fairly high even where I was. I think this spot will be *really* nice on days when they land from the north. I hope to be back for more photos very soon!

A few more shots on Flickr.

Tonight was Lindsey’s “graduation” from 5th grade. This is the last grade in elementary school here, after the summer break she moves on to middle school. It was a mercifully short event and the kids had a lot of fun. Can you tell from this photo that they’re 5th graders?!

After the celebration, we continued to celebrate by going out to dinner before I dropped the kids and my ex off at their house. A fine time was had by all. The kids have a partial school day tomorrow (about 3 hours for some reason, they won’t actually do anything) and then summer vacation commences.

In other news… my review of Eagle vs. Shark, the independant romantic-comedy from New Zealand, is now online. The quick and dirty summary, if you liked Napolean Dynomite you might like this, if you didn’t you may want to steer clear.